Two Movies On One Day

Today i went to Plaza Ambarukmo with my girlfriend to watch a movie and when we got there, there were two options of movies: Mr. Bean Holiday and Meet The Robinsons. The other three was 300, Nagabonar and Jakarta Undercover. We decided to watch both of the movies because the schedule enabled us to watch them (but we have to wait for about one hour before the second movie started). The first movie was played at 13:50 and the second one at 16:35. The movies were funny and it can be seen by everybody, so i guess you should watch it.

I also met some of my friends in this mall. One of them was Tony. He recognized me, and so did i, but i was uncertain that it was him or not (i would feel very bad if i spell other people's name), so i asked him and luckily it was him. We talked for some time before two of my relatives got there also and we had a chat together.

It's time to sleep now (i'm so tired today, since i slept at 1:30 AM in the morning yesterday)

Arranging Books and Items

Most of my items in Jakarta has been transfered to Jogja with some help from my uncle. The only things left in Jakarta was clothes, a small rack and also some items which i still need in my daily life, but it will be transfered also in the next following weeks. When i arrived to Jogja, i had to start arranging my items since i had a lot of items on my room which i don't need it anymore, but there's no more rooms for the items from Jakarta, so i had to arrange all of them by removing items which i don't need and moving some items which i think is still usable in the future and put them on a box but i didn't throw it away. With some help from my mother, finally we finish the arrangements in less than 1 hour and now my room is clean again (few hours ago, it was messed up with lots of things).

Even though it's already finished, but it's not the end of the arrangements. I will need to do more arrangements because i wanted to have more space on my room, so i guess at weekend i will be busy with this kind of arrangements. Most of the items were books (novel, programming book, comics).

I hope it won't take too much time, so i have some time to upgrade my Slackware system on my desktop into Slackware-Current so it will be the same with the laptop.

Journey to Jogja

As usual, i always write down my journey whenever i go somewhere (mostly to Jakarta/Jogjakarta). This time is Jogja and today is the day. At 9 AM, i went to the Blok M to get into airport bus which is the cheapest public transportation if you want to go to the airport (you only need to pay 15000 IDR). The bus was going to leave when i reached there. Luckily the driver saw me and he opened the door for me so i could got into the bus and go with that bus rather than having to wait for the next bus (the bus was already ready behind the current bus, but it's still empty, so i had to wait until the bus is full then it will start leaving the terminal).

The bus didn't go straight to the terminal 1A (where i should go because i use LION AIR airways, but went to the office, because the driver had to drop some persons there. Next route was the international terminal first and then continued by local terminal. I arrived at my terminal at 10 AM, the deadline to do check-in (just imagine if i had to wait for the next bus. What time would i arrive at the airport?), so i started to check-in after my friend who traveled with me already arrived there first. I almost forgot to brought my laptop after i put them in the scanner machine (no wonder my luggage was so light. I realized it after i walked for a few steps and wondering that i might missing something. Luckily the staff put them in a safe place, so nobody could take it).

After checking-in, we went to the upper floor and waited there because the boarding time was still 30 minutes, so i bought 2 Roti Boy because i hadn't had my breakfast and i was worried that it would be a delay (and it did happened) so i decided to bought it. After the boarding time was near, we went to the second scan just before entering the waiting room. This time, i almost forgot to take my cellphones (Argghh...), so this was the second time i forgot to get my items.

At the waiting room, we waited for about 30 minutes before the official announced that we would have one hour delay (it's always like this when i flight with LION AIR. My previous flight with LION was in December and that time, we had 2 hours of delay). The rain started to drop but not too heavy, and i was worried if it will cause more delays, but unfortunately it didn't happened.

We make nice flight, except for the rough landing and also some time wasted in the air because there was a practice by the local air force so we had to take some turn in the air (about 15 minutes) before we could land in Adisucipto Airport. Well, i finally arrived in Jogja safely. It's not the best trip, but i'm safe. That's the main point :D

HTML Validator Now Extended

One of my must-have Firefox extension is HTML Validator from this site. It will help you validating your page you are viewing (or developing) without having to visit W3C's validator so you can do it offline. Few days ago, this extension has been updated with a major addition to the parser and algorithm. Here's the new feature in the new version:

# validation with a different algorithm, a SGML parser (OpenSP). It is the same algorithm program than the one running on validator.w3.org. The validation is done based on the DTD definition of HTML.

# The help is written in a Wiki web side called Htmlpedia and synchronized at bundle time.

# validation of HTML pages after Javascript or Ajax execution

# the warning/errors pane is divided by columns that can be sorted by line/colum, message type, and so on

# line numbers next to the lines of code

# the number of errors is shown at the top and not at the bottom anymore

# a new XHTML help

The consequences is definitely the size. It was 2 MB now (previously was only 600 KB). But you will have more options after you install this application. Go get them now (Windows and Linux version is available)

Dell Start Giving Pre-Installed Linux

According to news i read in PCWorld, Dell is starting to give pre-installed Linux on their products (PC and Laptops) after they receive a lot of requests on their site which is designed to collect customer feedback (they receive about 500 comments about this Linux topic). Actually it's great news since customers can choose which operating system will be installed on their new system.

Axioo has also started this and now Dell follows. Who's Next?

OOo 2.2.0 Released

After the original schedule was delayed for about one month, finally OOo 2.2.0 has been released (but at this time of writing, the main download page is still displaying 2.1.0 version). You can download them from some mirrors down here:
- OSUOSL
- Goodie Domain Service
- PlanetMirror

Too bad, Indonesian mirror hasn't been updated yet, so i guess it will take 1-2 days to update them.

I will update this post when the official announcement from Louis has come up (he usually write some detail information about the release and send it to the mailing list). Before that happened, consider this as a information leak :D

Update (31 March 2007 01:18 AM): OK, it's not Louis, but John McCreesh who gave the official announcements of the release of OpenOffice.org 2.2.0 (See LWN article). The official press release can be seen here.

Laptop for DPR is Canceled

I saw in DetikInet today that the idea of giving laptops to most of DPR member has been canceled. According to the news, just before the final phase, there was a lot of protest from many people (and discussed in some blogs also) saying that it's only wasting money (approximately 12 billion rupiah will be spent for the 550 laptops with 21 million each).

It's said that the idea of giving this laptops has according to the procedures. The procedure might be correct, but unfortunately, it's not what people wants. People has paid a lot of money to the governments (mostly via taxes), but they don't get anything as a feedback. Even some member in DPR disagrees with this idea because of some reasons:
- They can buy their own laptop with his/her salary
- Some of them are not familiar with laptops
- Some of them thinks that they are enough with the PC provided in their office
- It's too much to spent 21 million for one laptop where you can get a nice laptop in 5-10 million
- the budget can be allocated in other sector

Well, personally i agree with the cancellation of this idea because it would save a lot of money and hopefully the budget can be allocated in other sector which is more important than laptops.

Back to Jogja

Same as Idban, i will also resign from my current company, but the difference is that i will have my last day by the end of next month (not this month). Another difference is that i will not move to other company. I'm going to pursuit for master degree which have been canceled once since i decided to join this company about one and half year ago. I'm planning to take my master degree at Jogja, my hometown. Why suddenly i decided to take my master degree? It's because i still have a strong motivation to learn new things and i don't know whether i will still have that kind of strong feeling in the next few years or not (hopefully i still do). Some people who have worked sometimes don't care about education anymore, because they think that they can earn money from their current job, but i'm aiming for higher target and master degree is one of the supporting factor and i also like to study and learn new things. That's the main reason.

I will miss all of my friends here in my company. They are good friends and we had a lot of good time together, even though only for about one and half year. But don't worry, as we can still keep in touch via many ways, such as emails, instant messaging, or even by phone.

I have packed most of my personal belonging and now my room is almost empty (last night was the hard work, since my uncle came to my boarding house and pick up most of my belonging and take it with them who also will leave to Jogja tommorrow by car). Most of the items left are clothes and some items which i still need at least for about one month before i completely left Jakarta.

By the way, i'm leaving to Jogja this week and having my holidays and also trying to get information about the master degree that i'm going to pursuit. I hope with the little time i got, i can get the information i need and if possible, i will register also.

I'm a person who can't live without Internet, so i guess i will use Speedy as my Internet Connection Provider when i'm in Jogja. It's great to hear that Speedy has been operating in Jogja, but i hope my area is included in their area. I have experienced using Speedy as my company used this also, so i already know where to complaint if something goes wrong. By having an Internet connection, i'm sure that most of my daily work that requires Internet connection will still continue even if i'm in Jogja (even though it might get slower at the beginning because of the setups done in Jogja).

Well, wish me luck about the trip and also for my master degree.

New Changes in YahooGroups

This morning, i got an email from Yahoo Groups Team saying that they have started to improve YahooGroups and add some more features, including protection to the group owner email addresses. Starting of March 26, YahooGroups will not support IFrame due to security problem described in Yahoo's Security Center. Any IFrame tag will not be showed in the page.

Yahoo will also turn on the Yahoo! Answer module by default on all groups, but this changes will not be available to all groups at one time. They plan to activate this step by step, just like when Blogger decided to get out of Beta phase.

One of the cool feature is the addon of the capacity to the storage which has just been upgraded to 100 MB. This includes files and photos.

Everything is also written in the Yahoo Groups Team Blog, so check that page out for more detailed information and also updates.

Security Holes Fixed in OOo 2.2.0

According to Computing, OOo suffers from trio security holes found by Next Generation Security Software and iDefence, and also posted in Debian Security Information. Due to this security holes, OOo 2.2.0 release schedule was postponed (read my previous post) for about a month. Well, be glad, since the security holes has already been fixed in the latest RC (OOo 2.2.0-rc4) and it's ready to be downloaded. Please read the Security Page for more detailed information about the security issues.

Louis Suarez-Potts has confirmed in his email that the release team is planning to release OOo 2.2.0 on March 28 (one month from the original schedule). I hope this time it will be correct.

Reunion at PIM

I had a reunion with my friends and also lecturers from UKDW at PIM just know. The reunion was held after quite a long discussion on the mailing list about where and when, but finally it's decided. There were quite a lot of people who came to this reunion and we have lots of talks there, discussing about lots of things.

I went there alone, since i stayed in my auntie's house which is near from PIM. The trip took me about 10-15 minutes and it wasn't as crowded as usual (i didn't know why), but that relieves me. Some of my colleagues went together with Edi Topan, who was willing to pick up some of them at Taman Anggrek Mall (and drive them back to their boarding house of course) hehehe

Now i'm waiting for the photos from them :D

Experience Upgrading Slackware-Current

Even though i have used Slackware-Current since 10.1 on my laptop up to now, the upgrade process was never as complicated as this time (Slackware 11.0 to -Current). I have just finished upgrading to -Current just now and i'm so relieved. I know that the process will be more difficult than previous process since the changes are major and there's a lot of changes in many packages, including the toolchain.

As usual, i read the WARNING and CHANGES_AND_HINT note as my primary guide. I also prepare the UPGRADE note since it's also noted in the two previous notes. Other file that i use is the -Current Changelog itself as it has the most detailed information regarding each package changes, so i guess it's mandatory to open the file also.

I followed the instructions given in the CHANGES_AND_HINTS, but i guess the note must be updated a little bit, since i'm having problem while configuring Xorg after the upgrade process, since i didn't have Expat package which is required to do some other process related to configuring the fonts (probably caching and setting the font path) which is done by the Slackware installer script.

The process itself was smooth, except for some small minor problem (i did lost my username account. Luckily the root account was still there, so i just have to re-create my own username and set the home directory to my previous home directory). I didn't know why, but it happened to me while upgrading. It must be my mistake while doing the process, but it's fixed. Next problem came when i wanted to run the graphical desktop. It always gives me an error message:

unable to open default font "fixed"

I thought this was due to lack of Expat package while i was installing the fonts, so i removed the fonts, and reinstalled all the fonts and then the problem was gone. Next problem was the default window manager. I usually used KDE and when i type startx, usually it showed KDE Splash Screen (i used Circular splash screen with Moodin engine), but now it showed an xterm and terminal. That was weird. When i click on the desktop, i realized this was not KDE. It was twm. So i switched to root user and call pkgtool utility to change the default desktop, but it's not working. I wonder why. Next, i tried to issue xwmconfig to change the default desktop using my local account and finally it worked. Now KDE starts up when i ran the startx command.

I still have some TODO list though:
- Compile the kernel with the latest GCC, so i can install NVidia driver (because NVidia installer will only work if i use the same GCC version being used to compile the kernel). I'm still using generic NVidia driver (nv) for now.

- Remove unneeded package (Slackware-Current does remove some package, so i still have to remove unneeded package, for example hotplug, kernel 2.4, pcmcia-cs, xmms). Yes, they decided to remove xmms as it has no progress anymore (the developer are working on xmms2, while we have audacious and amaroK which works also).

- Optimize the new system as it's a combination of packages since Slackware 10.1. This one will take quite some time and i don't know if i will have time to do this.

Upgrading to Slackware-Current is quite complicated, but it's still worthed for me. My advice to those who would like to upgrade to Slackware-Current: BACKUP ALL YOUR DATA FIRST!!! (Did i stress that enough?). Yes, backup is the most critical steps that you will have to take before doing something that have possibility to broke your system. Next is READ THE NOTES!!!. Those notes were made to be read, not to be ignored and it's worthed to read that notes, as you will get a step by step instructions on how to complete the process.

Remember, Slackware-Current will have the most updated packages, but it's not for people who would like to have stable system, as it might broke your system while upgrading. It's better for you to stick to Slackware 11.0 and wait for the final release before making the upgrades.

At least, i will have nice weekend as i don't have to tackle with serious problem due to the upgrade process :D

UPDATE (15:30): I have compile the latest kernel (2.6.20.3) and installed NVidia driver, but the NVidia logo didn't showed up, i wonder why. Perhaps it's because of the usage of new GCC version. Well, that's ok for now. At least i have the same kernel version with the GCC being used to compile the kernel.

UPDATE (16:30): I have removed all removed packages in Slackware-Current, including kernel 2.4.x, xmms, byacc, glut, gnet, gdk-pixbuf.

UPDATE (26 March 2007 09:15): I have solved the Moodin problem. Previously, the Splash screen that requires Moodin plugin won't work, since Moodin was compiled against KDE and now KDE's prefix has been changed from /opt/kde to /usr, so it will need to be rebuild, and thanks to Eric Hameleers for the updates of the SlackBuilds script. After recompiling the source, everything is back to normal again.

I also found a solution for the NVidia driver from LQ Forums. Some people had the same problem as i did and one of member posted a solution to work on this one, but i haven't tried yet. I will try to do this when i got home later on. If you are having the same problem as i did, try this sh NVIDIA-xxx.run --x-prefix=/usr --x-module-path=/usr/lib/xorg/modules (assuming that you are running Slackware-Current with new Xorg).

I also had a annoying error message at the startup about DBUS. I tried to reproduce by executing from root user and here goes the error messages:

root@laptop:/etc/dbus-1# dbus-uuidgen
dbus-uuidgen: symbol lookup error: dbus-uuidgen: undefined symbol: dbus_internal_do_not_use_create_uuid

Anybody has a solution?

Update (27 March 2007 09:09): DBUS problem solved. It seems that DBUS package from source didn't clean up very well, so it still leaves some library in their default directory (/usr/local/lib) thus it will be seen rather than the correct path in the Slackware packages (/usr/lib). Thanks to Rob Workman from LQ from the tips. The problem is solved by removing the files by issuing rm -rf /usr/local/lib/dbus-* and delete most of files in /usr/local that refers to DBUS source package (make sure you compare the files with the files listed in the Slackware packages just to make sure you didn't delete the needed file).

One more problem solved :D

Start Breaking Again

After more than 5 months of development and trial and error, finally Patrick Volkerding has decided to publicize the -current development again to the developers and other Slackware users who intended to seek for the next Slackware release (aiming for Slackware 12.0, but it will be officially called 11.1 for now).

As stated in the Changelog, dated Thu Nov 9 18:16:50 CST 2006, Patrick Volkerding already said that there will be a major renovations on the toolchain and it's true. If you see the -current Changelog, you will see lots of packages addition, removal, and upgrade. There are also some split up packages to make next Slackware release more modular (mostly from Xorg package. There are almost 300 new packages in x directory for the new Xorg 7.2 package only).

From the Changelog, it's most likely that the next Slackware release will be based on 2.6.x kernel only and it will be based on the latest stable kernel, but for now, Patrick still uses 2.6.18.8 version with SMP feature as the standard kernel. This is good news, as for the last 5 months, Slackware only update it's package for security vulnerabilities and it's considered outdated by some people, but NOT anymore. By using Slackware-current, you will get most of the latest version of each application available in default Slackware installation, like KDE 3.5.6, Xorg 7.2, GnuPG 2.0.3, XFCE 4.4.0, GIMP 2.2.13, CUPS 1.2.8, and many more.

PLEASE PLEASE READ the WARNING and CHANGES_AND_HINT note before you started to upgrade your Slackware version to -current or it may broke your system.

Yesterday, i started to list all new packages from -current and i started to download them all (slowly) and today, i will have them finished and start planning to upgrade to -current as it still have a chance to broke my system. When the upgrade finishes, i will start using -current as i did in the past.

Mozilla Firefox Release

Mozilla has released updates to their Mozilla Firefox products, 2.0.0.3 and 1.5.0.11 which contains only a small portion of changes:
* Website Compatibility: Fixed various web compatibility regressions.
* MFSA 2007-11 FTP PASV port-scanning

Since the changes are quite small, i think it won't take too much time to get the update using Live Update feature from Firefox. Just use Help > Check for Updates... menu and you will see that there's an update for Mozilla Firefox.

Month of ...

It all started when security researcher, HD Moore started to publish a browser's bug once a day for one full month in July 2006. That phenomena is now what we called Month of ... (you name it). We now have "Month of kernel bugs," a "Month of Apple Bugs," and a "Month of PHP Bugs". A newcomer has arrived, "Month of MySpace" where the author will write about bugs that happened in MySpace.

Here's the press release:

OFFICIAL ANNOUNCEMENT: April 2007 is the Month of Myspace Bugs, Yuss!
April, 2007, will be designated the "Month of Myspace Bugs, Yuss!" Reasons:

1. Myspace is important, in that there are a bazillion users and a kajillion dollars involved.
2. "Months of Bugs" are whiny, attention-seeking ploys for acceptance. Myspace's design use is to enable whiny, attention-seeking ploys for acceptance.
3. "Months of Bugs" are annoying, so rather than suffering through another, we figured it'd be better to just create our own where we could at least direct the content a little.

What's the next "Month of ..." ?? Any ideas?

Apollo From Adobe

Adobe has released a new cross-operating system runtime called Apollo which allows developers to leverage their existing web development skills (Flash, Flex, HTML, JavaScript, Ajax) to build and deploy rich Internet applications (RIAs) to the desktop. Here's some snippet from the original site:

Apollo enables developers to create applications that combine the benefits of web applications – network and user connectivity, rich media content, ease of development, and broad reach – with the strengths of desktop applications – application interactions, local resource access, personal settings, powerful functionality, and rich interactive experiences.

All you need is download the Apollo RunTime + SDK, and Flex (optional, only if you are interested in) and if you are having some problems, you can always look for technical articles, developer videos, and sample applications. Adobe has also provide some discussion room.

New Memory Manager in PHP 5.2

I read an article in IBM DeveloperWorks about new feature in PHP 5.2 which deals with new memory manager. Here's some text from the site:

There are many improvements that have taken place in PHP V5.2, and one critical area is that of memory management. The exact quote from README.ZEND_MM states: "The goal of the new memory manager (PHP5.2 and later) is reducing memory allocation overhead and speeding up memory management."

Here are some of the key items from the V5.2 release notes:

* Removed unnecessary --disable-zend-memory-manager configure option
* Added --enable-malloc-mm configure option, which is enabled by default in debug builds to allow using internal and external memory debuggers
* Allows tweaking the memory manager with ZEND_MM_MEM_TYPE and ZEND_MM_SEG_SIZE environment variables

When used effectively, the new memory-management tools will support your debugging efforts to reclaim some of your system resources. I think this is a good article to demonstrate how memory manager works and make debugging process even more detailed than ever, since we can see how many resources left within the system.

Linux on Axioo Laptops

My uncle just bought a new laptop and by default, it was installed by Mandriva Linux which has been modified by the Axioo Team. I was surprised when i see the configuration, since it's already very complete (using SMP kernel to support dual core, ACPI modules for laptop, including batteries monitoring, bluetooth, multimedia, and many more. They even modify the boot loader with Axioo's background and they provide a nice desktop wallpaper by default. The distro is based on Mandriva Linux 2007.0, using 2.6.17 kernel if i'm not mistaken and it was great.

I hope many other vendor will dare to do the same thing as Axioo did by providing a pre-installed Linux-based operating system on their products in the future.

K3b 1.0 Final Release

After one and a half year of development time, finally the final K3b 1.0 package has been released by the author (Sebastian Trüg). K3b is a feature-rich and easy to handle CD burning application for GNU/Linux platform which is commonly being used by many people (mostly that uses KDE as their Window Manager). You can see the incomplete Changelog for more detailed changes. It's quite a big jump from the previous stable release, 0.12.17, but i guess it's worthed, since K3b is quite mature for that kind of application and i have experienced of using K3b and it worked perfectly, even though my only experiments was only burning data CD, not other operation which are available.

Here are some feature that are already implemented in K3b:
* Creating data cds
* Creating audio cds
* Creating Video CDs
* Creating mixed-mode CDs
* Creating eMovix CDs
* CD Copy
* DVD burning
* CD Ripping
* DVD Ripping and DivX/XviD encoding
* Save/load projects.
* Blanking of CDR-Ws.
* Retrieving Table of contents and cdr information.
* Writing existing iso images to CD or DVD with optional verification of the written data.
* Writing cue/bin files created for CDRWIN
* DVD copy (no video transcoding yet)
* Enhanced CD device handling

There's a nice article about K3b final release (this article was posted before K3b released 1.0 version)

Blogger Error

In the last few days, i always had an error message displayed when i tried to publish my post on my blog. I don't know why, but it wasn't mentioned in Blogger Status page. Last night, i wanted to post something but i always got the error page, so i wanted to retry it, but since i was in hurry (because i had to go to Taman Anggrek with my friend), so i didn't continue it and shut down my computer (i forgot to save it in Draft) :(
I hope blogger will fix this problem ASAP

MySQL Community Release 5.0.37

MySQL AB has released a community version of the next MySQL version, 5.0.37 last month (i didn't notice this until just now). This version was released in binary and source code version. The last binary release was 5.0.33 which was released in January and MySQL has confirmed that will keep providing binary release, but with less frequency. You can see the Release Note for detailed changes in this version compared to previous version.

OpenID

OpenID is now a big trend in IT community, media, and forum discussion. Here's the description from Wikipedia:

It's a decentralized system to verify one's online identity. While it is not intended to prevent spam or create a trust metric, it solves the single sign-on problem without relying on any centralized website to confirm digital identity. OpenID users identify themselves with a URI or XRI which they own, such as for a blog or a home page. Since OpenID is decentralized, any website can employ OpenID software as a way for users to sign in.

If you want to get your OpenID account, you might try to get it from one of OpenID providers. I already have my own OpenID which i have just registered at GetOpenID. Why do i pick this server? Because it is the one of the few OpenID servers that supports SSL. Some countries in Asia has already their own server for OpenID, for example Philippines, China, Japan, India, Korea. Too bad, Indonesia is not listed there because we don't have that currently.

How does it work? It's not that complicated. OpenID is based on unique URL which is now a common thing nowadays as Internet is now public and the technology has been considered mature. You can use your web page, your blog, your friendster page, your MySpace page, etc as your account as long it can be considered your identity. So, instead of using usernames and password, you will now use URL as your identifier when you tried to login to site that supports OpenID (for example OpenID Wiki).

Here's one simple example : I tried to login to OpenID Wiki using my OpenID which i got from GetOpenID and when i do that, the page redirect me to my Provider page (GetOpenID) and asked for my password as proof that i have the valid account there. When i have entered my password, they confirmed that i have the valid account and redirect me back to OpenID Wiki. Next, they asked me to pick a username for that (since i can use different username than the one i specified in my OpenID account) and that's it. I'm now registered to OpenID Wiki. Of course not all site supports for OpenID currently, so let's just wait until most site supports OpenID technology, but while waiting for that time, why don't you prepare yourself and get yourself and OpenID account?


Reference:
Wikipedia
Linux.Com
OpenID Wiki

New -Stable Kernel Again

I have just upgraded my kernel into 2.6.20.2 two days ago and new -stable kernel has come out today (2.6.20.3), but with less patches compared to 2.6.20.2 which consists of a lot of patches. I think i will skip this version because most of the patches were about NETFILTER and some things that i don't need at this moment. I'll wait for the next -stable kernel or next final kernel release (2.6.21), which i doubt will be out in short time. Aside from the patches, i also didn't have time tonight to perform the compilation as i have to go somewhere tonight.

By the way, Linux Kernel Archives celebrates it's ten years of serving the community after it was announced at 13 March 1997 by Peter Anvin. They add new images also in the main page. Check it out...

New Feature in Stable Kernel?

Last night, i performed a kernel compilation and upgrade it to the latest -stable kernel (2.6.20.2) and it was very quick, since i do all the compilation in a single command, by issuing make bzImage; make modules; make modules_install which will
1) Create new kernel image
2) Compile the modules
3) Install the modules

After all of above commands were finished, i just have to copy some files to /boot directory (System.map, .config, and bzImage), rename it to reflect the kernel version and assign the correct symlink (System.map -> System.map-2.6.20.2, config -> config-2.6.20.2, vmlinuz -> vmlinuz-2.6.20.2).

Why do i choose this kind of scheme? Well, in my opinion, it's easier if we gave the version number on the file, so when we want to delete the old kernel, we can just do it by deleting the file that matches with the number, so if you have just upgraded to 2.6.20.2 and you want to delete 2.6.19, you can just type rm *2.6.19* in /boot, /lib/modules, and /usr/src (make sure that your new 2.6.20.2 kernel works first before deleting this files, since it's irreversible).

One thing that makes me curious is that there was a new question when i ran make oldconfig, which didn't suppose to be there, since it's a -stable kernel. Usually, a -stable kernel only consists of security update or bug fixes, but not new feature(s) which should be done in the next final kernel release. The question was about new feature to support 2/3 button emulation on Macintosh computers. When i traced back to the Changelog, i found this information:

commit ee3b6b5324ad82788fb051fac4765a7e6835b454
Author: Soeren Sonnenburg <kernel@nn7.de>
Date: Thu Feb 8 14:20:38 2007 -0800

enable mouse button 2+3 emulation for x86 macs

As macbook/macbook pro's also have to live with a single mouse button the following patch just enables the Macintosh device drivers menu in Kconfig + adds the macintosh dir to the obj-* to make macbook* users happy (who use exactly that since months....

Signed-off-by: Soeren Sonnenburg <kernel@nn7.de>
Cc: Benjamin Herrenschmidt <benh@kernel.crashing.org>
Cc: Paul Mackerras <paulus@samba.org>
Cc: Dmitry Torokhov <dtor@mail.ru>
Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton <akpm@linux-foundation.org>
Signed-off-by: Greg Kroah-Hartman <gregkh@suse.de>

I guess that it won't bite too much if this feature is being added and something goes wrong, so they just put this updates on -stable kernel (even though it's disabled by default if you enabled them in the configuration phase since i'm not using Macintosh).

Time To Upgrade

Usually, a stable kernel only consist of small amount of patches, but not for 2.6.20.2. This version consists of a bunch of updates and bug fixes, which mostly are related to security. Why does this version contains a lot of patches? I don't know, but since Greg and Chris was busy with 2.6.18 and 2.6.19 in the last 1-2 weeks, it seems that the patches have been waiting to be released and when they decided that they had stopped the future release of older kernel, they start working on the current -stable kernel which also needs an upgrade. You can see the full Changelog to see what has changed since 2.6.20.1.

I skipped 2.6.20.1, since it only consists of 1 patch and i didn't think my system need that version, but i'm sure that i will upgrade to 2.6.20.2 (hopefully tonight). I hope the compilation won't take too much time. In my personal opinion, kernel 2.6.19 and 2.6.20 are faster than previous kernel (in case of compilation time). Perhaps it's because there were some deletion on some unneeded modules, such as OSS (here and here) or because they have fixed some compilation warnings/errors, so the compilers don't have to fix it during compilation.

Mandriva Corporate Desktop 4.0

Mandriva has just launched a beta program for Mandriva Corporate Desktop 4.0 which aims for business users seeking early access to the latest Mandriva enterprise technology. The program is designed to allow business users to test Mandriva on their hardware and with their software needs, and to collaborate with Mandriva's development team to insure stability and broad hardware support.

Here's the email message i got from Mandriva's newsletter:

Mandriva is pleased to announce the launch of the beta program of
Corporate Desktop 4.0, the brand new version of its enterprise-dedicated work station.

Ergonomic, secure, comprehensive, easy to use and to administer: by consulting its corporate clients and by exploiting its experience in the desktop area, Mandriva developed Corporate Desktop 4.0, a distribution that can be installed in less than 10 minutes and extensively customized thanks to a new post-installation tool.

Mandriva emphasizes the key points for business: directory administration and integration, mobility, security and ergonomics.

* Directory administration and integration: To complement directory-based authentication, Corporate Desktop 4 includes a new tool to set KDE user rights from an LDAP directory.

* Mobility: Simplified configuration of secure remote access (DrakVPN), simplified configuration of 3G data cards in order to remain efficient wherever you are. Mandriva also plans to release Corporate Desktop 4.0 on a secured USB key, in order for you to be able to access your data and your work environment anywhere at any
time.

* Security: Data encryption, high security authentication (smart cards and fingerprint readers supported), secure connections, interactive firewall.

* Ergonomics: A completely new design for the desktop, integration of the latest 3D technlologies (Xgl, AIGLX and Metisse), and the ease of use and accessibility you expect from a Mandriva desktop.

Mandriva also takes advantage of its partnerships with many hardware vendors and software publishers to offer extensive hardware compatibility and a complete range of ISV software. Thus, Intel, HP, NVIDIA, Arkeia, BitDefender, VMware and many more participated in the development of the product and were naturally integrated in the
Corporate Desktop 4.0 distribution.

Like every Mandriva product, Corporate Desktop 4.0 comes with an extensive range of services: long term security and bugfix maintenance lifespan (5 years), Web support, professionnal phone support, and expert consulting services to develop particular projects and help you migrate to Linux.

Corporate Desktop 4.0 works perfectly in a mixed Linux / Microsoft Windows environment and will blend easily into your network with its support for common systems of authentication, access to shared data, and support for collaborative work solutions.

To participate in the evaluation program, visit:
http://corpo.mandriva.com/xwiki/bin/view/CD4/

To register and download the beta:
https://my.mandriva.com/cd4/trial/

As a complement to its desktop solution, Mandriva offers server and park administration solutions: Corporate Server 4.0 and Mandriva Pulse.

If you are lucky, you might even get a free license (depends on your organization level and also your participants on the testing phase).

PicasaWeb Upgraded

If you have been using PicasaWeb like i do, then you will like this news, as Google has upgrade this free service (they do have commercial service with more storage) with bunch of new features and also more free storage (it's now 1 GB, that's four times the original storage and it's counting, like in GMail). Another cool feature is that now you can link to your friend's gallery and gets an email notifications when somebody leaves a comments on your photo or your favorite have uploaded a new photo.

You can see all of the new features here.

Buying Another Novel

Last night i went to Taman Anggrek Mall with my friends. We supposed to met our friend there and give something to her, but too bad she didn't showed up. We went there at 5.20 PM and i went to gramedia book store to bought a novel which i already saw in their website and it's already available. I'm looking for the second and third book of Philip Pullman's His Dark Material trilogy book (The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass). I already got the first one (Northern Light aka Golden Compass) and i have written about it here and here.

The funny thing is that when i asked the customer service about the book location, he offered me an automatic search via computer and when i mentioned the book title (in English), only one of them was showing up. That's strange, since i already saw it on their websites, so i guess the websites are more up to date than the book store itself, so i would buy the second book first can came back later when the third book is available. Next, we went to the location of the second book was placed and i saw the third book also. That was strange, it didn't come up in their program previously, so i asked him again. He said that this is the Indonesian translation, so they didn't add the English title on the program thus it won't be displayed. Another weirdness, since usually the program should be able to search based on every keywords being inputted to the program. I just hope they read this and fix their program :D

Anyway, there's also one good novel which i plan to buy when i already finished reading this novel, which is The Historian which is also available in Gramedia yesterday, but it's still quite expensive and i already bought two novels, so i postponed it for now.

Another Accident

Another accident from Indonesian Airways (this time Garuda Indonesia) has add another bad image on how local airways works. The latest accident was happening today with 49 casualties reported so far (others are still being evacuated and identified). The plane was burned in Adi Sucipto international airport of Jogjakarta (my hometown) and it's now being closed for further investigation.

Garuda Indonesia is willing to pay all medical treatment for their passenger which is a good news because they thought it was their responsible (give credit for Garuda for this one. I hope other airways will do the same). This plane was carrying a total of 133 passengers, including 7 plane's crews, so in total they have 140 peoples on that plane.

The cause of the accident is still unknown. We might have to wait for further investigation. For now, Garuda Indonesia has opened a call center on 021-2312193 or 2311801 ext 7205 if you want to find more information about the passenger on that plane (i received this information via YM and keep spreading this). Here's another information from Detik:

GARUDA INDONESIA AIRPORT:
487880/487882/ 484261
081 328 180 019 (Mr. LARAS WIDHYO)
0817 469 271 (Mr. SENTOT)
0817 277 345 (Mr SONNY)

1. RS. AKADEMI ANGKATAN DARAT (AAU) - BLOK O - LANUD ADISUTJIPTO
2. RS. PANTI RINI (Ph. 0274 - 497 206) - RINGISAN KALASAN

GARUDA HOTLINE in JAKARTA
021-2312193 or 021-2311801 ext 7205
021-2311393 or 021-2310049 or 3520461

Kuliax On InfoLinux

Kuliax distro, made by Indonesian people is now bundled on the latest edition of InfoLinux magazine. If you have problem downloading the ISO, you might consider to buy InfoLinux magazine. If you want to have cheaper one, you can also buy the mini version of InfoLinux which has just been introduced (similar to PCMedia who already offered mini version for some time). I hope that this distro will be supported by many college and can also be used in daily educational activities.

My Previous Article About Kuliax

Adding Sudoku to Your Websites

Nowadays, many people likes to play Sudoku in their spare time. Even my ex colleagues likes to play Sudoku so much and he tried to beat his own record all the time. Well, i did try to play Sudoku and at that time (long time ago), i didn't like it as much as he did, but when i tried to play that game again, it's quite interesting actually. If you have your own websites, you can help other people who likes to play sudoku by adding Sudoku games into your websites. All you have to do is go to this URL and grab the script provided. If you don't have Internet connection, you can also download a free Sudoku games which are available on many sites.

By the way, the basic rule of Sudoku is very simple:

fill each blank spaces of your puzzle with a number from 1 to 9. No digit must be repeated in the same column, line or grid of 3X3 squares.

Another Quick Release

There has been another quick release from one of Open Source application today. This time is PHPMyAdmin who has fixed a possible deep recursion attack after MoPB (Month of PHP Bugs) has released a summary of a bug in PHP application and the example being used is PHPMyAdmin. The Security team of PHPMyAdmin does a quick research and they have released PHPMyAdmin 2.10.0.2 and also offer a patch from their websites (see Security Note PMASA-2007-3 for more detail).

Again i decided to download the patch and apply the patch manually, because it's very small and it only affecting 1 file, libraries/common.lib.php. Find this function: function PMA_arrayWalkRecursive(&$array, $function, $apply_to_keys_also = false) and then change the content into :

/**
  * calls $function for every element in $array recursively
  *
  * this function is protected against deep recursion attack CVE-2006-1549,
  * 1000 seems to be more than enough
  *
  * @see http://www.php-security.org/MOPB/MOPB-02-2007.html
  * @see http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2006-1549
  *
 */
function PMA_arrayWalkRecursive(&$array, $function, $apply_to_keys_also = false)
{
    static $recursive_counter = 0;
    if (++$recursive_counter > 1000) {
       die('possible deep recursion attack');
    }

    foreach ($array as $key => $value) {
        if (is_array($value)) {
            PMA_arrayWalkRecursive($array[$key], $function, $apply_to_keys_also);
        } else {
            $array[$key] = $function($value);
        }

        if ($apply_to_keys_also && is_string($key)) {
            $new_key = $function($key);
            if ($new_key != $key) {
                $array[$new_key] = $array[$key];
                unset($array[$key]);
            }
        }
    }
    
    $recursive_counter++;
}

Don't forget to change the version in Config.class.php into 2.10.0.2 and you're done with PHPMyAdmin. It has reflected the latest version.

In my opinion, it's not completely PHP's fault. We as the developer should also give this kind of protection to our application because the resources are limited, so we should try not to pass that limit. Actually this kind of attack not only affecting PHPMyAdmin, but also other application which uses recursive array function like what PHPMyAdmin had, so better check your application now before it's too late.

Fixing Bulb

Two days ago, my bulb had started to mess up. Sometimes, it went off and then on again and each day, the frequency was getting closer, so i guess it's time to replace the bulb and change it with the new one. I have used this bulb for about 1,5 years since i moved to Jakarta up to now and i don't know how long the bulb has been up there. So i get a ladder because a chair is not sufficient to reach the ceiling to plug off the bulb. After that i went to sleep without no light (i usually turn off the lamp when i go to sleep)

So yesterday, i bought a new bulb and when i got back from the office, i take out the new bulb and plug it into the correct place (again i have to take the ladder) and after ensuring that i already put it into the correct position, i started to turn on the switch and it worked. Now my room is shinning again :D

Manually Updating PHPMyAdmin

Few days ago, i have downloaded PHPMyAdmin 2.10.0 and the next day, they released an update which contains only one changes in how PHPMyAdmin should connect to the MySQL Server (whether it should use SSL or not). The default value for the 2.10.0 version is True, which causes some problems on some servers, so they wanted to be changed to False and they did change that with the release of 2.10.0.1.

Instead of having to re-download all of the application, i can update the application manually, because all i have to do is just edit the config.inc.php file and set the value into False and that's it. But wait. The version will need to be updated also, so i start searching for files which set the version of the application and finally i found it. It's in Config.class.php file. There's where the version is stored. I changed it into 2.10.1 and it's completely an updated version of PHPMyAdmin :D

WordPress Compromised

WordPress has released another update to it's popular engine due to modified download file which was a result of a compromised server in wordpress server. If you have just download WordPress 2.1.1 in the last 3-4 days, it's recommended that you upgrade to the latest version, 2.1.2 which is already been verified as a clean file and also fix some minor problem.

Reference:
WordPress

WebBlog Updated

Today i just updated my weblog to include a local Google Search form and also fix a broken image link for the OOo Get Legal Campaign. The local Google Search Form is just a copy from my website, but i changed the sitesearch value to reflect this blog's URL and also some changes on the layout, since i made my own CSS code on my websites, so when i wanted to put it on Blogger, i have to make some adjustment.

Before this, when i wanted to search for particular post, i have to browse all of my archives and that's not efficient (i know i could login to the Blogger and use the internal searching feature included, but sometimes logging in Blogger can cause some problem, mostly at busy hours). So i decided to put a local Google Search Form to make me and reader easier to search for specific post on my blog.

Quick PHP 4.4.6 Release

PHP team has released a new update for PHP 4.4.x version, which is PHP 4.4.6 and fix a crash problem that was introduced in PHP 4.4.5. The problem occurs when session variables are used while register_globals is enabled. This version also upgrades their PCRE version into 7.0 and fix some other minor bugs. Here's the small changelog between 4.4.5 and 4.4.6 (from PHP's Changelog):

* Updated PCRE to version 7.0.
* Fixed segfault in ext/session when register_globals=On.
* Fixed bug #40635 (segfault in cURL extension).
* Fixed bug #40611 (possible cURL memory error).
* Fixed bug #40578 (imagettftext() multithreading issue).
* Fixed bug #40502 (ext/interbase compile failure).
* Fixed bug #40286 (PHP fastcgi with PHP_FCGI_CHILDREN don't kill children when parent is killed).

If you have been using PHP 4.4.x version, it's recommended that you upgrade to this version.

Nice Firefox Logo

One of OSUOSL's staff had photos about Firefox's logo made in a huge field where they cut the dry grass and change it into Firefox logo. (I got his URL when i browsed Linux Kernel's site and see a news about new git server that is now running using an old server which was damaged, but it's working now).

Check them out here and here (beware, the files are approximately 3 MB big)

Unicode Support for PHP 6

PHP 6 was scheduled to be released at the end of this year with lots of improvements and new support for Unicode (oh, don't forget about major changes in how PHP works, mostly with current common behavior that we found today, like Register Global, Magic Quotes, Safe Mode, etc). First alpha release was scheduled to be released at the end of the first quarter of 2007.

Here's some information about Unicode and how it will be implemented in PHP 6:

Unicode is an effort to map the characters of all human languages for use with computers. Version 5.0 of Unicode, released in the fall of 2006, contains nearly 100,000 characters and has the capacity for about a million. Support for Unicode in software is well underway, usually via one of the Unicode Transformation Formats: UTF-8, UTF-16, or UTF-32

Unicode support in PHP 6.0 will include a broad selection of International Components for Unicode (ICU). These components will include provision for such actions as converting between one locale or character set and another, collation, transliteration, Unicode text processing, and Unicode regular expressions. Such functionality will be available when a Unicode.semantics code switch is enabled.

To accommodate this change, PHP 6.0 will switch from having a single, generic string type to having two: a Unicode string type for text data, implemented through UTF-16, and a binary type, which will include actual binary data and text data for legacy locales. Perhaps the most obvious difference in the string types is that each character in a binary string will be one byte long, while in a Unicode string, a character may use more than a single byte, depending on the language and how it is encoded. In addition, within Unicode strings, characters may be referenced by either name or code point.

When a PHP program runs, runtime encoding will specify which encoding to use. The encoding for a script will be encoded either as an INI setting, or with a declare () statement in the first line, in much the same way as in an XML file. The encoding may be changed later in the script with a pragma. The encoding for standard output and for file and directory name may also be specified, as well as how conversions between the two string types are handled. Since legacy character sets cannot support all Unicode characters, programmers will also be able to set how conversion errors are handled and the format in which PHP reports them.

With Unicode support, not only will identifiers within the code be able to use Unicode characters, but a whole range of new functionality will become available. Programmers will be able to specify how information is collated by choosing a locale, and by specifying criteria, such as how accented or upper case characters are treated. Even more usefully, text can be converted from one locale to another, so that, for example, English speakers can read Greek names in Latin characters, or a Japanese reader can convert full-width characters to half-width ones on the fly.

As usual, the developer tried to make the migration between 5.x and 6.x as smooth as possible, but broken code will likely to be seen everywhere, so when the beta or RC version has arrived, perhaps it's better to start analyzing it and tried to test your site on a test server with PHP 6 installed before the final version comes up. Doing this will reduce the time required to recode the work when the final version comes up, because mostly RC already works for most cases, while it still needs some improvements before going public with final version.

PHP Developers are getting very fast while the public hasn't adopted PHP 5.x completely, since many web hosting still uses PHP 4.x on their server (because if they upgrade to PHP 5, some of their client's website may display a lot of error messages or warnings on their site and it won't be good for the business). Now, they are ready to do the same thing with PHP 6.

References:
Minutes PHP Developer Meeting
Linux.com
Core PHP